Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

I would like to start a discussion here about desire.

The Buddha said that desire is the cause of all pain. But my belief, and my experience, is that that is not true. I believe that people are weakened tremendously when they try to turn off their desire. Desire is important to human beings.

No person ever got enlightened without a tremendous amount of desire; desire for God, desire for the truth, etc

Also, no person ever made a significant positive difference in this world without HUGE desire. Jesus had it; Ghandi had it; St. Francis, Mandela, St. Theresa, Martin Luther King…. Name any person who made a big difference, and I'll bet my last dollar they were a person of huge desire and passion.

And also, desire is one of the greatest joys of human life. It is one of the greatest joys inherent in all relationships, with both human beings and God. Our relationship with God and people are impassioned and enlivened by desire.

In fact, our desire is our gift to people. Without it, what would they do? When we love, our desire is awakened, and for good reason (and I’m not only talking about sexual desire, which certainly can be beautiful and good, but I am talking about desire in ALL relationships and forms). Desire is inherent in love, it is inherent in our recognition of each other. How can we recognize one another truly and not desire.

I believe that selfishness is the cause of all pain, and that we have linked desire to selfishness in our minds because of how often we have acted on selfish desires. For that reason, we think we need to kill our desire to be spiritual. But, selfishness and desire don’t need to be married. Desire can be married to LOVE, and that’s a true match made in heaven.

It takes morality to be willing to desire big and not be selfish. I think that is the challenge of spiritual/human life, not killing our desire.

Please post comments and let me know what you think.

If you’re interested, here are links to two great articles about desire, and how to use it for spiritual growth and upliftment, and other spiritually good purposes.

The first is called ‘Desire for Life’. This article looks at common fears about desire, and shows why they are irrational. It describes ways to get over anti-desire hang ups, and how to use desire positively. This is an excellent article: http://www.soulprogress.com/html/ArticlesFolder/Articles/DesireForLife.shtml

The second is called ‘Endless Love’, and it is a very deep and extensive look into how to use energy and desire for the realization of spiritual unity; how and why people avoid desire, and what do to break those patterns; desire in love and relationship, and more. It’s truly one of a kind. I’ve never read anything else like it. But it's also somewhat controversial. Here is the link: http://www.soulprogress.com/html/ArticlesFolder/Articles/EndlessLove.shtml


Enjoy.

Regards,

Mana

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Will is effort, and effort comes from desire.
Buddha spoke of Nirvana as the state of Spiritual Heaven active in waking human consciousness. The awareness of the one eternal moment of reality - ultimate reality - primal causation - first cause. The spark of eternal awareness. (When God realized himself as All, as “god”.)
In full and actual Heaven awareness, the sublime bliss of perfect being yields such an endless bounty of everything positive, that there is no emptiness in the soul whatsoever; no negativity, no pain, no need, no desire. All will is instantaneously fulfilled. When there is no contrast there is no distinction. Separation is caused by distinction, and desire comes from the illusion of separation.
In Nirvana, all is of the same essence, and all being essentially identical, why is one to distinguish between this or that. There is no distinction to be made, no desire to be had, no preference. Desire springs from an emptiness that wishes to be filled. Desire is of emotion, of feeling, of meaning, of compulsion, of action and reaction. In Buddha's account of enlightenment, the spirit is so consciously full of “nothingness”, that the emptiness is no longer empty, and the fullness is beautiful, becoming pure light, pure life, pure awareness pure awareness, and pure transcendence/awakening.  
To be in such a perfect state that you desire nothing, because you are fully conscious that you already HAVE everything.
To be in such a perfect state that you desire “nothingness” - buddha's reality. 

I do fully agree with you though that the world needs desire as will to climb the ropes of awareness. Buddha needed desire to wake up. Awakening is very much a product of will. When one is awakened, however, he realizes that life, past and future, is held in Universal Memory.

To desire not to desire is still a desire!

Love,
Henri Thomas

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

I have had Two experiences of Desire.
One experience of desire showed me that Desire was a positive thing, the Active Voice of the Motivating Force of my Soul Working it's Will In the Concious Life.
One experience of Desire Showed Me that The things We want can be unhealthy For us, No Matter how much We want them.

You can Desire Something and Reach for It.  When in this Reaching you see yourself Go farther, become More, In order to attain this Desired thing, It is worthwile.  If you are Grown in Any way Because of your Desire, (Provided of course that you harm no one else in your process) then it is a very positive thing.  If there had Been No Desire to Achieve Oneness with Divinity, Then there would Never Have been a Spiritual Master.  Ever.

You can Desire something And Reach For it, and you can Be Burned. You can be thwarted and Denied and put off in Every Way, You can Be made less by your Desires to such a degree that Any attainment is Phyrric.  You can waste so much of yourself Striving that you can Loose sight of who you are and indeed, What you were after in the first place.  Just ask Anyone who has ever loved someone who decided that they loved Drugs more.

But Happiness is the Function of Wisdom.  The More Wisdom we have, the easier it is for us to see what we can do to be happy.  It is a matter of Personal choice, of Personal Discernment, as to what Desire is Healthy and what desire is  unhealthy.  Judge not, and Neither Condemn, For you know Not Why a thing Happens, Nor to what End.

And I believe, by the way, that the Buddha said “suffering”.
Pain is a Physical Response to Stimulus.
Suffering is a Judgement that states that Pain is Bad.

Or at least, that Is what I think.  I don't know.  I wasn't there.

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Perhaps we are confusing desire with intention.

Desire has connotations of craving, longing for, and coveting, which indicates that something is missing. Intent connotes keenly directed attention. I would submit that desire springs from the human condition of ignorance and delusion that we are not complete as we are. That we need something that we do not already have. Desire drives us to look outside of ourselves for the solution to our spiritual fulfillment, and causes us to form attachments to external agents.

Intent, on the other hand, springs from the wisdom and understanding that we are already complete. Everything is already as it should be, including ourselves and our relationship to the absolute and temporal. Armed with this understanding we can free ourselves from trying to judge emotions, such as desire, as 'good' or 'bad', and operate from the place within ourselves where love and compassion flow without any “effort” on our part. If we are keenly attentive to staying present and mindful, the rest takes care of itself.

Offered in love.
Carol

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Thank you everybody, for your thoughtful responses. I have really enjoyed reading them today.

I agree that there are definitely discernments to be made about desire to be able to understand it and handle it rightly. Amy spoke of two different types of desires. I have experienced this: there is the desire that comes from lack, and the desire that comes simply from seeing, and even from awareness of unity.

In the world today, we mostly associate desire with lack. When we are unhappy, we desire happiness. When we are hungry, we desire food. And even the desire to help the world is a natural response to lack. We feel the world's misery, we feel the extreme need for truth and happiness in the world, and we want to help. This is a natural response, which tells us when something is not quite right.

But it can certainly go too far. We can become hyper-focused in small and greedy desires, because of our belief that we are lacking and separate, and that can cause us to become even more out reality. Even spiritual seekers, who strive for enlightenment, often bury themselves because of the fact that their focus is on the fact that they LACK enlightenment, and so the more they seek the more they enforce that idea, and it ends up being a very painful and slow journey; in which they believe themselves to be distant from God, on an impossible journey, or as”sinners”.

And when we desire one another, or God, out of lack, that is certainly not a sound basis for a relationship.

But this kind of desire is by no means the only kind of desire. There is a kind of desire that is BORN of unity awareness. If find that the higher my state of consciousness is, the more I feel this type of desire. This is a desire that is huge, and inclusive, and very aware of the unity of life, and of all, but also extremely appreciative of the beautiful diversity within unity. It is a desire born of recognition and seeing. I see each soul, and desire that soul tremendously, because I feel our unity, AND I feel the diversity of us within the unity.

It's the experience of a dance within the unity; a dance in which I can recognize all as being sweet, beautiful; and my being is attracted to their being with great intensity. And that great attraction has nothing to do with personal lack, or desire to consume or “have”. It is a seeing and an attraction. And then out of that comes a desire to honor, uplift and help. And none of this ever means that I think we are separate or different. In fact, I feel each person as my very own heart.

God created a diverse creation (or, if you don't believe in a personal God, you could replace that with Universal consciousness created it). And the intention, I believe, was for us to be ever aware of our unity and sameness, and yet enjoy the dance of diversity within that sameness WITHOUT negative attachments, greed or selfishness; and without the sense of separation that causes all that. It is more like the dance of Fred and Ginger. There is a certain joy in the dance that they are able to do together, as man and woman, and enjoyment of it. We dance together with a deep awareness of our unity, and a passionate enjoyment of our diversity.

I believe that human beings need to be able to USE the desire that comes from lack, without hurting ourselves by focusing on and believing in that lack too much (which creates selfishness in us). I think that to do that we need to keep our eye on reality. In other words, when we desire God or truth, keep our eyes on the truth, and on God. Remember that we desire God and the truth because it is beautiful, and magnificent, and part of who we are, and not because we are separate or lacking. And persue that desire, with the knowledge that we are already full. That is closer to the desire that is born of unity, but it uses the natural tendency to desire when we feel lack.

And then, when we feel our TRULY natural desire, which is born of awareness and seeing, to allow that, not to shut down to it. People do that all the time, and all it does is it stops the flow of reality, and closes up our hearts. That is why there are thousands of nuns, and monks, and spiritual aspirants of all kinds, who are spiritually dead, and stuck. They tried too hard to kill their desire, and they didn't make enough discernments about that.

I do agree, though, that selfish desires need to be set aside for the sake of love and truth. I know that there is a type of desire that is small, clingy, and completely out of reality in it's hyper-focus (this desire which comes from a false idea of ourselves, and from lack and separation). These desires, I know, need to be transcended.

It's true, Light, that when we experience Nirvana, our small desires die. I've experienced that to some degree, where there is no more clinging or reaching to have for oneself, because you feel full, complete. But then a new desire is born, or allowed. And also, the desire to help, because of the lack that you feel in the world, is greatly magnified. Suddenly the way you used to desire before seems so tiny. I have felt, as my consciousness has risen, that I never even KNEW desire before I (more fully) experienced God, reality, real Love, my Self. Not real desire anyway, not desire of this magnitude.

Anyway, I hope I wasn't too redundant or longwinded in my efforts to be understandable. I tried to be considerately concise, but it felt like all of that needed to be said for me communicate what I wanted to communicate.

Amy, I think you are right that the Buddha said “suffering” and not “pain”. Please excuse the misquote.

Thanks again.

Love,

Mana

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Mana,
What you said about there being Many Spiritually Dead Monks and Nuns Really hit home for Me.
I have Had an experience I feel is similar to that.  For about Two Years, after the End of my Marrige, I decided that I had the opportunity to Divest myself of desire.  I went as deeply into the Work of cutting off my attachments as I could.  At the time, the Only thing Required of me by Anyone was the $250.00 for Rent that I was Paying My Mother's Boyfriend.  So I continued to work.  But Other than Going to work and Coming home, I did Nothing But Sit, Or Yoga, Or Acting Zen.  I Didn't have any Friends.  I became distant with My mother, I turned my back on a Group of Spiritual entities that have Been with me for Years Helping and guiding Me… and I woke up One day, and I felt Nothing.
And That whole Day there was nothing.  My mind was Like a quiet room, where you sit and wait for someone to speak.  And Nothing is Said. 
I waited, and I began to think that perhaps there was something wrong.  But then Let the Idea Go.  I let go the Worry and I let go the reason that I let it go.  But It came back.
And I wondered if it was Healthy for me to be Nothing.  Because that is what I was Being.  Nothing.  No happy, No sad, No Desire No Attachment… and No Enlightenment.  Just Nothing.
And I think then, that I decided quite arbitrarily that I didn't like it.  I decided that I would, If I allowed this to go any farther, End up quitting my job, and sitting on the carpet in my bedroom, forgetting to eat, until someone else noticed how unhealthy that was.  And Out of my refusal to be a burdon to Others, I decided that There is no point, For Me, To cut off my Desire, or My attachments to things, Because In those Lies the path to who I really am.  I am no Buddha.  I May have Walked right through Nirvana, Decided I didn't like the Wallpaper and Walked back out again without realizing, But I am Glad.  Glad that I can be superficial.
Because It takes strength to admit that you are someone, Anyone other than what people want you to be, Or tell you you should be, Or think is Best to be.
I decided that Though they say that Every Day a Master puts something Down, I have chosen to believe that They have the wisdom to have great care in that… And know better than to discard a vital piece of themselves.
Yah, you can Become empty.  But What is that worth if you do not fill yourself again with Good things?  Things that are YOU.  Things that help you and others around you to Grow.

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Dear Amy,

Indeed, the masters have enough care and wisdom to put down what should be put down, and they also have great care not to reject that which is themselves. But the masters also take great care not to decide too decisively what is themselves. And my advice to  you (if you want advice, that is) would be to do the same. I would be careful about deciding who you are not and who you are based on these experiences, because that's an easy way to trap yourself.

People are deciding all the time that they are this, and not that. And what they decide, although it doesn't change their essential nature, it does hinder them from being able to experience it. We get too stuck on what we've decided about who we are, and then we think we have to be that. For example, “I am no Buddha” is a decision about who you are that is not actually true. And because you think that you are not being the Buddha. You may not literally be the Buddha, as in the actual man, but the consciousness of the Buddha, and the enlightenment of the Buddha is yours.

I agree with your choice to be involved in life though. To learn to love, and live rightly within life; these are ways in which you will find who you really are. To be involved in life with true integrity; to experiment with love; to put your heart out there in ways that you wouldn't usually do,but which your heart yearns to do; to be willing to be vulnerable. When we do these things, our heart gets to be expressed. We get to be ourselves. And in that, in that love, and feeling and vulnerability, and givingness, you will FEEL yourself, and you will see with great clarity that which is not yourself, that which is just ideas, false ideas. You will see what is flase because it will conflict with love, and be restrictive of love. And when you see that,  you can put those things down.

I've had this experience: For a few years now, I have done a lot of meditating, and other spiritual practices. And it has been very good; the experiences I've had and the way that I've grown have been good. But I came to see, just recently that spiritual life is not just about mystical experience and God communion. We are really here to love. Love IS the highest “state”, the highest way of being. It doesn't actually matter too much what spiritual experiences you have. Love is really, I dare say, the only thing that really counts. And love requires involvement in life.

But again, I would also be weary of deciding what spiritual experience is – specifically, what the experience of Nothingness is, or what it can be – based on your experience. Because it CAN be something TRULY good and wonderful.

I believe that the experience you had was some variant of nothing. There are many ways to experience nothing. For example, you can experience nothing by exercising for a very very long time, until you're completely physically exhausted, finished. At that point there is no emotion, no attachment, happiness or sadness. Nothing. You can even experience a form of nothing by going through a greal deal of emotional pain. Eventually the psyche goes into some kind of fatigue, and you feel nothing. I'm not sure what you particular experience was, but I can assure you, there is a Nothingness that IS worth “knowing”. Now, I know this may seem like I'm backpeddling, or contradicting myself, but I will explain why it's not. There is nothing wrong with the experience of Nothing.

Indeed, there is an experience of Nothing that is superb. There is a Nothing one can go into, and when you come out of it, everything is healed. And you do have no no ideas, no attachment, no complications. This experience is good for people. It wipes the plate clean. It's like dying and coming back again; like a baby, you're clean, your mind and emotions are free. As physical objects come back into focus you see that they are all made of the same essence, and you see all people as God. Everything is sweet.

And I believe (though I haven't experienced this fully) one can experience the reality of Nothing WHILE experiencing life, diversity, desire. One can walk around as Nothing, while walking around as a body, and a mind, and a person. One can be all of this at once. Because that's who we are. In the Hindu tradition this is the goal, to acheive an enlightenment in which you can live and be involved in life WHILE experiencing God union. I have experienced a small part of this, in that I have experienced God communion while going about daily business, and I have experienced desiring from the heart of God, which is not a small or selfish desire. But this thing of being able to be Nothing and present and involved in life at the same time is not something I can speak with much authority on. I'm speaking mostly from hearsay, intuition, and from having had a small glimpse of this, but not yet having accepted it, or let go sufficiently to allow it.

Anyway, my point is, there is a place for mystic experience, and Nothingness is fine. And also, there is a place for living, loving, desiring. It's not one or the other. It's both. In fact, neither one does that well without the other. We need the space that Nothingness and/or God communion provides to really live effectively, without reacting, contracting, etc; and also, we need the passion, desire, joy, beauty of diversity, to live as who we are. All of this is who we are.

Much Love,

Mana

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

I thought about your reply for a little while before I decided to reply In kind.
Some of what you said to me made me think that I have made another mistake.
::laughs::  I Make alot of those!
I think there is Value in the fact that I totally set down the idea of the possibility of my attaining enlightenment, Because I had been very obsessed with that since I was 16.
My mistake though, perhaps was allowing myself to let go of all desire for a higher spiritual experience.
And What you said about Defining One's Self Serving to Confine one's Self in One Idea Seemed very wise to me.  I read somewhere that it would be pointless for “god” to Manifest in any particular form because we would assign god that form and that form Only Forever More.
And I think Maybe we are that way about ourselves.  If I assign myself a particular Idea of self, I can get stuck in that Idea and Loose the possibility of knowing myself to be something else.
I sometimes have a hard time trusting myself.  I don't know where that came from.  but I Really would like to Have the experience of trusting Myself again, to break out of this funk that I seem to have found myself in.

My experience of Nothing was a place I carved out where my Heart should have Been.  I was being Quite Emo at the time Because as I said, I had Just let go of a Six year relationship in which I had had a Deep emotional investment.  I have Found more Alive experiences of Divinity in Loving, as you have so eloquently stated already.  And I think Perhaps Now I can Forgive myself for being Emo.  And forgive the Memory of that state of Emptiness.

My highest Experience is Not THE highest experience.  This statement opens the possibility of having higher experiences still.  Perhaps I can let myself out of this cage yet.
Perhaps I can Summon True Desire to the effect of being Happy and free.

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Dear Amy,

I agree that the thing about letting go of your obsession with enlightenment was probably a good thing. There are times when we can get ourselves onto a treadmill of seeking that is not entirely helpful.  At that point it's time to do something else. An enlightened master said (and this is paraphrasing, because I can't remember his exact words) something like: I was fortunate, in that I never desired enlightenment. I only ever desired to be a good lover; and in learning to do that I found enlightenment. That caused my path to be much faster than many others.

When it comes to the thing about defining and confining oneself: being willing to take risks, love risks; to put your heart on your sleeve, make gestures of love that you would  normally withhold – these things are ways to break out of that rut. When you have ideas about who you are, and you go about your days living as those ideas, you become fearful of the parts of yourself that are outside of those ideas. You do not want to express passion, for example, if you do not think of yourself as a passionate person. Or, if you think of yourself as weak, you will avoid being emotionally invested and vulnerable, so as to avoid getting hurt. To take the risks that you wouldn't normally take, in a good spirit, can really challenge the false self-identity that you hold.

Seeing as we've gotton totally off the topic of desire, maybe we should carry on this conversation via personal messaging, or else start a new thread about self-identification. What do you think? Let me know.

Love,

Mana

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

I think that the Sufi's have a very good understanding of this. Throughout time mystics have made the spiritual path seem very complicated when actually is is quite simple. All that is needed is a change in one's point of view. They did this because one must be awake and ready to embark upon this path because to those who still grasp the material world, it would only cause confusion by existing in a state of duality. Therefore, the mystics teach that a soul that is still asleep should be alowed to sleep until it awakens to the need to embark upon the spiritual path. It would be presumptuous and, indeed, sinful to do otherwise. 

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

One thing that we often forget when talking about what Buddha said, is that he was on earth as a teacher for many years; and that his teachings were personal, for the people he spoke to, and not intended to be dogma.

That said, they have been passed on for generations, and not only through the Buddhist religious sangha, but through general reading, because they resonate with so many, and have stood the test of time.

So- my answer to your question would be- if our desires are satisfied, and we can stay in gratitude when they are, then they are helping us achieve what we really want. If so, how can they be dangerous?

And if we go after what we desire, and on achieving that, are still unfulfilled, still full of desire, then all we have to do, is to go within and find out what we really seek!

When we reach the awareness of where desires spring from, they become the lights on the path, showing us where we are going; and all thoughts of danger, shoulds and shouldnt's, struggle and suffering, flow away.

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

You are right, Minaakshi, that the Buddha was talking to specific people, at a specific time, when he said those words. And it's easy for things to be taken out of context and made into dogma. The same thing happened with Jesus, and many others. The reason I mentioned it was because, since it has become dogma, that particular dogma needs to be addressed; because, I believe, it is causing pain. Those particular words (as they have been interpreted) have had a powerful effect  on thousand of Buddhists, who have weakened themselves incredibly, and slowed down their spiritual awakening, by trying to kill their desire.

I also agree with the thing you said about discovering where desire really comes from, and going with that. People are definitely substituting their real, heartfelt desires with desires for things that are far less soul-fulfilling and satisfying. It is only when we get in touch with our TRUE desire that we find the true power and usefulness of it.

I think that it would be easy for people to misunderstand what you said as meaning that if your desires lead you to acheive what you want they are good, and if they do not they are not. I'm sure that is not what you meant, but I thought it would be worth bringing it up, to avoid misunderstandings by anybody. Obviously, there are small and greedy desires that can be fulfilled, and we can even feel a certain gratitude when they are fulfilled (although not the true and deep and spiritual gratitude that you are talking about), and those desires are still not good desires. And then, there is the desire for God, which may be fulfilled, and yet STILL exist. I believe that the desire for God, and the desire for one another, continues on  even after it's fulfillment, or at least it can. And when it does it is very good.

Are we on the same wavelength?

Love,

Mana

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Hi Mana,

Yes, you are right - I do not mean there are good or bad desires; mostly because I was not speaking from the good-bad perspective. I feel that desire is the soul's longing for union with God or the oneness from which it arose.

About whether desire can persist after its fulfillment….I don't think it is possible; because when it is fulfilled - a desire for Oneness, e.g.; can only be fulfilled when there is oneness. And when duality goes, so does the thread that brought about its disappearance.

Perhaps, as Amy points out, it depends on how we are defining desire.

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

I would like to take this thread in a slightly new direction, which is to think about HOW desire can be used for spiritual growth, and relationship.

Desire creates a great deal of energy, and stamina, and driving power.

So for example, in a relationship, where there is great desire, there is great energy, and that can create an ecstatic relationship, an ecstatic communion between people. If you've ever experienced a really high energy exchange with another human being, or group of human beings (which I'm sure most people have) you can appreciate that. If you take that far enough it can become something truly spiritual. (if it is handled rightly/ethically/lovingly of course, otherwise it will tend to kill itself off. Either the relationship will become flat over time, or the energy will be used in very negative ways, thereby lowering the energy and tone of the relationship).

And the same is true in our relationship with God. When we approach our spiritual practices with desire and passion, we do so with great stamina, and energy. And that energy is increased because of the connection with God that desiring God creates.

Energy is related to conciousness. In many traditions energy raising practices are used to raise our consciousness. Meditation, yoga, tantra; all of those are examples of that. When our energy is high, our consciousness tends to be high. When we are sleepy, for example, we tend to be less clear, more grouchy, more prone to lose our temper, or be insecure, or depressed, or whatever our personal tendency is. Whereas when our energy is high every seems crystal clear, we feel ecstatic and generous, and full. Energy, when raised high enough, can turn into God communion, and eventually God union. So, by increasing energy, desire is also increasing our consciousness; and, if it gets high enough, creating the experience of unity.

So we have excellent reasons to allow desire in our lives, and even fan the flames of desire. It can improve our relationships with each other, and with God, dramatically; and it can heigten our consciousness and enliven our lives. It is a quality of life decision.

Here is a link to an article about how energy and consciousness are related. It explains it really well, far better than I have: http://www.soulprogress.com/html/ArticlesFolder/Articles/EnergyandUnderstanding.shtml

Here is a quote from St. Francis about desire and energy:

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Desire is a blessed and powerful energy. I hope to speak simply and briefly because I LOVE desire.

Desire is a feeling of being alive. Desire is a creative surge forward. Desire is a calling out to myself, and to divine.   We speak of Divine Longing… is this me longing for the Divine, or Divine longing for me? 

Desire ,while grounded deliciously in my sensesand awakened in body mind spirit and emotion, Desire calls me into spirit, and transcendence. Let me know God in my body, let me feel the full force of craving. Let my craving be answered with breath, sound, movement.

Wah Mah Chi.

A Christian minister who performed my son's wedding said “God's love for us is Erotic. God Desires US.”

I can go for that.

Desire is spiritually useful because it points us in the direction of God. It is our answer to God calling.

More than Metaphor to me.

Blessings to all,

Carla

Re: Desire: spiritually useful or spiritually dangerous?

Perhaps, There is a Trouble here, With the Definition of the Term Desire?
I think it may be Very Common to Mistakenly interchange The Concept of Desire, and the Concept of Want.

I think Maybe Desire is a Motion of the Soul Choosing any Given Thing or Experience in your Life.

And I think Want is Something Lower than this,  Perhaps A Decision made that is Not a Wholistic decision.  Like wanting Shoes.
A Person Who is Poor, and Cannot afford Shoes, Who must Walk from place to Place, and Bare the Pain of Blisters on the feet may Have a Legitimate Desire For Shoes.
But When I Go to WalMart and I see Some Bright Green Lace Up Sandals, I might want those Sandals… but I don't Know if it could Properly be Called desire.